Tag: international politics

Chanakya has been called the “Indian Machiavelli” because his writings have a political pragmatism similar to that seen in Machiavelli’s own work. He has also been called “Kingmaker” because, as one book description notes,

Striving to make Chandragupta`s position secure in an unstable and dangerous time, Chanakya championed a policy of realpolitik. He deployed a large network of spies, ensured testing for the king`s food and shelter; averted disasters through keen detection like that of ants carrying rice through cracks in flooring. He was not averse to spreading rumors to win over an opponent to the king`s side. Behind all this was the burning desire to stir the country`s ruler to sweep away the vestiges of Greek rule that remained behind Alexander`s invasion and return from India.

According to Wikipedia, Chanakya lived c. 370–283 BCE and was an Indian teacher, philosopher and royal advisor to the first Maurya emperor Chandragupta. He was also “a professor of economics and political science at the ancient Takshashila University.”

Chanakya played an important role in the rise of the Maurya Empire, which ruled most of the Indian subcontinent. Chanakya was chief advisor to both Chandragupta and his son Bindusara.

Chanakya is traditionally identified by two other names: Kautilya and Vishnu Gupta. In the 4th century BCE, he wrote the ancient Indian political treatise called Arthashastra. This has been variously translated as “science of politics… to help a king in “the acquisition and protection of the earth,” “treatise on polity,” “science of material gain,” “science of polity,” and “science of political economy.” You can read it in several places, including here (PDF version here).

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The Municipal Machiavelli

The Municipal Machiavelli is a (mostly) satirical look at Machiavelli's master work, The Prince with commentary and observations, applying his ideas to municipal politics. It is not meant as a scholarly or definitive approach to Machiavelli's philosophy, politics or art. As Juvenal wrote, "Difficile est saturam non scribere:" It is difficult not to write satire.

Similarly, Montaigne wrote, "My natural style is comedy, but one whose form is personal to me, a private style unsuited to public business..." One can only hope the reader gets the humour intended, but appreciation cannot be forced.

However, the author sincerely hopes that in reading his words, you gain some insight into Machiavellian issues, as well as the engaging and sometimes contentious practice of municipal governance and campaigning. And that you get a bit of a chuckle along the way.

Machiavelli called this Chapter III: Concerning Mixed Principalities. In it, he wrote about new principalities that had been conquered by outsiders, or their leaders overthrown by the populace. In today’s terms this could refer to a group of incumbents getting tossed out at election time, and replaced by a slate of like-minded newcomers. That’s not [...]

“Never were divine favors late.” I say this because I appear to have lost, no, mislaid your favor, since you have gone a long time without writing me, and I was doubtful whence the cause could arise. And of all those that came to my mind I took little account except for one, when [...]

Machiavelli wrote that there were three courses of action to take in any state that had enjoyed its independence and freedom before being taken over. Think of this ‘independent state’ as your municipality before you were elected. His advice directs you in ways to deal with staff and returning incumbents in order to consolidate your power:

There is no evidence that Niccolo Machiavelli ever met the charismatic Dominican friar and fiery preacher, Girolamo Savonarola, but we know he attended at least one of the friar’s sermons. In a letter to Ricciardo Bechi, dated March 9, 1498, Machiavelli described his experience. He was not impressed. He wrote that, in his judgement, Savonarola [...]

Sometime in the next two weeks, I will be amalgamating servers for the several sites I manage and conflating them onto one, new and (I hope) faster and more efficient server. There may be some downtime while the files and databases migrate, like virtual birds, to their new home.